The question of the week will be taken from the Sadler Fan Club message board. If you are 2009 Sadler Fan Club member and would like access to the message board please visit the board at http://sadlerfanclub.yuku.com/bsadlerfanclub.

When signing up please send us your Name and Email Address so we can verify membership with the Sadler Fan Club.  Once on the board just go to the Question of the Week section and submit your question.  Elliott will answer just about anything!  Click to view all of the questions...

Week Seventeen Question

Question:  What is the purpose of the gravel, or kitty litter, on the road courses? All it seems its good for is tearing up the car if you end up in it. We don't use it at any other tracks.

-- submitted by Tracy from Rockford, IL

Answer:  It's mainly there to keep you from crashing your car. It's made to stop you kinda like if you were going down a mountain on the Interstate and you see those truck ramps for trucks that lose their brakes. We used to have a lot more of the run offs than we do now. If you look at turn 1 at The Glen and the carousel, etc. it's now all asphalt. I personally like the asphalt better for our races but at the same time I think it's valuable for a lot of the other racing series. Think about it this way: If you're a racer and don't have a big budget you'd much rather run your car into the gravel trap and be stuck than to hit the barrier and ruin your car. The road courses host a lot of races other than just Cup. In our series we prefer to make a mistake and be able to recover from it rather than be stuck in a gravel trap and lose a lap.
o.